Srinagar, Sep 17 : Former Chairman of Hurriyat conference and senior separatist leader, Abdul Gani Bhat passed away on Wednesday at his home in Botingoo village of Sopore in Jammu and Kashmir.

Family sources confirmed that Prof Bhat, a resident of Botingoo village in Sopore area of Baramulla district, breathed his last at his residence after a brief illness today evening.

A prominent political figure, he remained active in Kashmir's separatist politics for several decades. According to the family, details regarding his funeral prayers will be announced later.

Born in 1935 in Botingoo, a village near Sopore in Jammu and Kashmir, Bhat grew up in a household that valued education. He studied at Srinagar's historic SP College before moving on to postgraduate studies in Persian and later acquiring a law degree from Aligarh Muslim University.

Returning to his home state, he began teaching Persian at the Government Degree College in Poonch, a career he cherished and pursued for over two decades before politics pulled him into a different calling.

He co-founded the Muslim United Front (MUF) in 1986, later served as chairman of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC), a coalition of separatist groups formed in 1993, and was president of the Muslim Conference, Jammu and Kashmir (MCJK), a banned political faction by the government of India.

He was a teacher in a government college in Sopore when the then governor, Jagmohan terminated his services for anti-national activities.

Bhat later actively participated in separatist politics and was a pioneering leader of the Muslim united front (MuF) that was a coming together of different separatist parties who fought the 1987 elections in coalition against the NC headed by Farooq Abdullah.

The 1987 elections were believed to have been largely rigged to keep the MuF leaders out of the state assembly.

It is generally believed that after getting disgruntled with the democratic process, young election agents and supporters of separatist leaders in 1987 elections were the first to cross the border and return with weapons to start an armed insurgency in Kashmir in 1989.

/IANS